


Emotion

by carlyraejepsen



Category: Persona 5
Genre: Angst, Bisexuality, Established Relationship, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Implied Sexual Content, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, No Spoilers, Pining, Underage Drinking, mentions of abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-08
Updated: 2017-05-08
Packaged: 2018-10-29 12:13:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10853778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carlyraejepsen/pseuds/carlyraejepsen
Summary: Two Best Friends Attempt To Pretend That Everything is Okay After Sharing a Couch— What Happens Next Will SHOCK You





	Emotion

**Author's Note:**

> this is a sequel to [Less Lonelier](http://archiveofourown.org/works/10779756) since i got so many nice comments on it & yall wanted a resolution? read that one first & then come read this Thank U

_“I want you,” says Akira, his voice rough and sweet and lovely, clinging onto Ryuji’s shirt and wringing the fabric in his hands. “I-I want you so bad, and I wanna be with you always, Ryuji, I want you to always stay right next to me.” Everything feels so close and so far away at the same time, and Ryuji can’t speak when he tries to, can’t even move his arms, can only stare as Akira presses his flushed face into his chest, knocking his glasses askew. “Ryuji, please, if you’d let me,” he says, and he sinks down slowly, slowly to his knees, his black hair curling out everywhere like cat fur, soft as heaven, “If you’d just let me—”_

Ryuji wakes up when he feels himself jolt forward, clutching at his thin blankets, panting and feverish and disoriented. It’s pitch black in the living room, hot and muggy and silent except for the incessant chirping of the cicadas outside. The AC must’ve gone out again.

It takes a minute or so of confusion before it really sets in that he’s a disgusting human being. He keeps trying to take his mind off yesterday afternoon, keeps telling himself that if he just doesn't think about it too much, then everything will go back to how it was. His mind won’t stop doing awful shit no matter how hard he tries, and he keeps thinking of the weirdest things, things he’d never even thought of before like how soft Akira’s hands were or how warm his skin was or how it might feel to go on a date with a guy, and then he has _dreams_ where—

No. No, Ryuji isn’t gonna think about it anymore. He’s ready to ignore all this stupid shit he’s been feeling and just forget about everything. He’ll change the subject— he’ll just think of something else until he falls asleep again, until he drives all of this bullshit out of his thick skull.

It’d be a lot easier to get to sleep if the cicadas would stop fucking screeching, though. Why did they even do that? It’s to get a mate, right? He’s pretty sure he’d read that somewhere. They just scream and scream out there to be noticed. To be seen.

To be loved.

Ryuji groans, slaps his hands over his face and digs his nails into his sweaty forehead and scrapes down for having such a stupid thought— they're _bugs_ , for Christ’s sake, what the hell is he even _thinking_ about? He’s so hot and uncomfortable that he wants nothing more than a quick and easy death. He curses, reaches clumsily down over the side of the couch for that overused box of tissues—

His hand finds something else instead, something soft and fuzzy. He picks it up, and it’s heavier than he’d expected, knit in wool or something.

It’s Akira’s sweater. Ryuji suddenly has a flash of memory where Akira goes home after dinner in just his undershirt and his blazer, and his heart stops. He’d left his sweater here. He forgot to get his sweater. He suddenly feels like the material is fragile, like it’s about to wither and rip into shreds in his hands.

Immediately, instinctively, Ryuji holds it against his face, shudders, feels his sore legs tense up. It smells like cologne. It smells like coffee beans. It smells the way his clean room in the attic does. _God_ , Ryuji’s just fucking disgusting. He’s a terrible friend— a terrible _person_ , at this point. He’ll return this tomorrow, he tells himself, he’s gonna give it right back to Akira the next day at school. He’s not gonna give in to all the gross shit in his head no matter how bad he wants to. He’s not like this. He’s gonna keep acting like everything’s okay, because everything _is_ okay. This isn't happening. There’s no way this is happening to him.

Until tomorrow, though—

Ryuji puts the sweater down over his pillow, tucking the sleeves underneath until it spreads across and encases it. He lays back down on it and thinks about rainy days, freshly brewed coffee, neat attics, cats with soft black fur. Houses that feel like homes, and stupid glasses with fake lenses that don’t even do anything.

* * *

Akira’s almost shocked by how normal everything seems.

They still hang out in the school hallways, and they still meet up with all their friends in the afternoon. Ryuji still texts Akira almost every night, and they're always making plans to go for a jog or see a movie or something. Even when they're alone together, it’s just like it was before, just telling each other stupid shit and cracking each other up.

When they're alone, though, there are these weird pauses every once in awhile. Like when Ryuji loses it over something Akira’d shown him on his phone and he puts a hand on his shoulder to keep himself from falling over, and then there’s this drawn-out moment when their eyes meet and the laughter fades and his hand slips, drags its way down his arm, falls off so that they don’t touch anymore. Ryuji stares at him like he doesn't have a single thought in his mind, and then he mumbles something like, “That’s hella funny,” and then he gets up and stands about four or five feet away from Akira before they can continue their conversation like usual.

Besides that kind of thing, everything’s alright. They’re still surprisingly comfortable around each other, and even though Akira still feels his chest tighten every time Ryuji smiles at him, he decides that he’s okay with this. He understands that Ryuji isn’t comfortable enough with his identity for this kind of thing, that it isn’t any sort of judgement on Akira, that everything will be fine between them if they just forget about it. After a couple of weeks, he’s calmed into a state of acceptance. As long as they can still be friends, Akira’ll be totally content.

At least until now. It’s a stuffy night in May when Akira wakes up to the sound of his phone ringing. When his eyes adjust, he reads that it’s Ryuji calling him, and it’s 3AM. He only starts to piece those two pieces of information together once he picks up. “Hello?”

“Dude… I can’t…” Ryuji doesn't even sound like himself, his words somewhat winded and strained. “I can’t do this shit anymore. I can’t do this. I can’t fuckin’ do it.”

“Do what? Do— hey, slow down, what—”

“I-I can’t stop thinkin’ about it,” he sniffs, tinny and distant over the phone. “About how you looked at me during. You were lookin’ at me like I was so much to you, like you really wanted me, nobody’s ever _wanted_ me that much before, I’m always thinkin’ about how you looked, you were so nice, I really just fucked it all up to hell—” He sighs, sniffs again, and Akira’s heart almost jumps out of his chest. The fan buzzes weakly in the corner of his room. “I can’t pretend it’s the same, ‘cause it’s _not_ the same, I caught so many fuckin’ feelings and I don't know what the hell to do, I’m always just thinkin’ about it every night ‘cause I can’t do anythin’ else n’ I can’t do this shit anymore I feel like I’m gonna lose my goddamn _mind_. I still have your sweater—”

“Are you— Ryuji, are you jerking off or crying?” He asks, because his drowsy mind is suddenly spinning and he genuinely can’t tell over the phone, and he figures it’d be impolite to assume either one.

“... Maybe a lil’ of both?” Is the hesitant reply, and Akira bites the tip of his tongue so hard that it goes numb.

“Look… Look, how about we talk about this at school? It’s late—”

“No, people’ll fuckin’ _hear_ us at school, I know people’ll hear us, we can't talk about this shit in person we— I’m so fuckin’ sorry for doin’ this, I’m just gonna hang up, I’m so sorry—”

“Whoa, c’mon, _please_ don’t do that,” Akira runs a hand over his face, unsticks his back from the hot sheets as he sits up. “We can work this out, we’re friends, we can talk about it—”

“I don’t think you’d wanna be friends anymore if you knew the shit I’ve been thinking about you,” Ryuji hisses, and there’s a beat where all Akira hears is his heavy breathing on the other end, the fuzzy static, the buzzing fan. He feels his pulse in his ears, in his tongue where he’d bitten down.

His voice breaks when he asks softly, “Do you … do you have feelings for me?” He swallows. There’s a choking noise, and then the line goes completely silent. “‘Cause all you have to do is tell me, and we can—”

His phone blares three angry tones as Ryuji hangs up, leaving Akira flustered and frustrated and incredibly, _devastatingly_ alone in his own bed. He swears, throws his hot phone down at the foot of the mattress and slams his head into pillow, burying his face in it, his heart pounding. He wants to scream, and he spends what feel like hours in the dark fighting the urge to get up and sneak out and see him face to face, tell him that it doesn't have to be like this. It’s fucking _agonizing_ , being like this.

So when Ryuji meets him by the stairwell in his usual spot and greets him with “Wassup, man?” at school the next day, grinning wide and leaning casually against the wall, Akira wants to punch himself square in the face.

Weeks drag on this way, Ryuji acting like everything’s okay and Akira playing along with it in order to keep Ryuji from having a breakdown. They never talk about it. They don’t talk about the afternoon on the couch and they don’t talk about the phone call, they don't talk about anything personal; when they're alone together, they talk about soccer and girls and video games. Akira isn’t content anymore, and he’ll _never_ be content going on like this— he _knows_ Ryuji is hiding his feelings from him, and it's absolutely _infuriating_ to dance around it with jokes and playful banter, to feel so hopelessly disconnected from his closest friend in the world.

They do everything together. They train, they eat, they study, they hang out with Ann, they go see concerts in an endless loop of platonic affection, of touching confessions of trust from a meter’s distance (“I feel so free when I talk to you,” he states over a monjayaki dinner with a friendly smile, and Akira smiles so fake that he fears his gums might bleed). They go to the _bathhouse_ together, for fuck's sake, and nothing fucking happens. At the mall, they ironically pose like schoolgirls in a Print Club booth, making two halves of a heart with their hands— Akira snatches his copy of the picture away, pretends to laugh when Ryuji does, keeps it folded up under his pillow every night and looks at it whenever he can't go to sleep.

They never go anywhere private anymore. When they study, it's at a booth in Café Leblanc, and when Ryuji wants to come over to Akira’s, he always brings Mishima with him. He hasn’t been to Ryuji’s apartment since that one lucid afternoon, and it starts to feel like it never happened in the first place, like Akira'd imagined it out of nothing.

About a month goes by, and Akira’s fucking exhausted, but nobody seems to notice. Life goes on like normal. The two of them— the delinquents that they are— they go out for dinner at this bistro where the lights are dim enough that a couple of high schoolers can order beer, and they each get two bottles of the cheapest brew on the menu, clinking them together when they’re served and congratulating each other on their success as if they’re businessmen. It tastes like carbonated piss, but Akira doesn’t mind too much. He’s never really drank before, so he’s dizzy and numb in his fingertips by the time he finishes the first one, and halfway through the second, their conversations suddenly become really interesting. Ryuji doesn’t seem as bad, but his face is still flushed and his smile is crooked and giddy, and he keeps slouching against him in their booth, and Akira nearly has an aneurysm trying not to put an arm around him or kiss his cheek or something stupid.

It takes about five minutes for them to split the check— they're bad enough at math when they're _sober_ , so trying to divide it and find the right percentage for the tip like this is hellish— and then Ryuji starts rambling about how good this one anime is, going on and on and on about the concept and the character dynamics and the quality of the animation. Akira feels warm and comfortable, like he could lay his head down anywhere and just fall asleep at the table.

“So right now, Deku has to go fight the creepy-ass purple bitch, right? For the tournament? Then he freezes up n’ the effin’ episode just _ends_ , and I’m like, what the shit?” He slaps a hand down, clattering the silverware. “Now I gotta wait ‘till next week to see what the hell happens. I’m pissed off.”

“You dunno what happens?” Akira runs a finger under his glasses and rubs his eye. “Didn't you just read the manga?”

“I don’t know how to read,” Ryuji scoffs, “I’m illiterate. I can't read. I don’t have eyes.”

“Ryuji, you have eyes.”

“I don't even have _hands_ , dude, how would I be able to pick up a book?” He laughs quiet at first, and then he _loses_ it, starts cackling at his own stupid nonsensical joke. It’s so cute that Akira wants to shoot himself. “I don't— I don’t have hands _or_ eyes! I can’t effin’ read!”

Akira starts laughing too, a combination of tipsiness and tiredness and plain amusement. Their sides keep pressing closer and closer together, and Akira yawns as they fade into sporadic bursts of chuckling, slumping down, laying his head on Ryuji’s shoulder.

“... Dude,” he guffaws, nudging him off with his elbow. “Stoppit.”

“What?”

“People’ll get the wrong idea. C’mon.” Ryuji huffs bemusedly, shrugging again and again to get him to move.

“ _Would_ it be the wrong idea, though?” Akira asks jokingly. "Wouldn't they kinda be right?"

Ryuji goes completely still. He looks down at the check, then looks at his phone. “We should get goin’,” he says stonily. “It’s late.”

“Aw, _shit_ ,” Akira groans, leaning the other way and running his hands through his hair. “God, if I come home like this, Sojiro’s gonna be _pissed_.”

“We’re not even drunk, man. We’re, like, buzzed at best.” He suddenly gets up, stands at the edge of the table. “You’ll pretty much be fine by the time you get to the train station.”

Akira sighs again, “The _traaain_ ,” and he lets his head hit the table. “I don’t wanna take the train. I’m tired.”

“You’re such a lightweight, Jesus _Christ_ ,” Ryuji snickers, takes his forearm and starts shaking it insistently. “And here I was thinkin’ you were so cool. You don’t even _drink_?”

“What, do you?”

He seems to shut down a bit more, dropping his arm, sticking his hand in his pocket. “Used to.”

“Why?” No response. Maybe he didn’t hear. “Why’d you used to?” He repeats, louder this time. "Hey, Ryuji—"

Ryuji shoves his other hand in his pocket, leaning back on his heels and looking at the ceiling. “‘Cause when you’re gettin’ beat up every day n’ left alone every night, what the fuck else are you _s’posed_ to do?” He laughs emptily, and Akira’s eyes go wide. “Don’t need to anymore ‘cause Dad left, but _damn_ , Akira, you can be kinda dense sometimes.”

Guilt sinks into his chest as soon as he sits up. “... I’m sorry,” he says, gets up and grabs his bag out of the booth. “I’ll go home. I’m really sorry,” he says, then starts toward the exit—

Ryuji grabs him by the shoulder, stopping him in his tracks. The restaurant seems to freeze around them. “It's okay, man, I'm not mad. Look— if you really feel that drunk, then you can just— you can— my house is, like, three blocks away,” he finally sighs as if he’s giving up. “I don't want you gettin' in trouble. You can spend the night.”

It takes Akira longer than he’d like to admit to fully process the offer. He’s stuck staring at Ryuji for a long moment before he nods, gives him a shaky smile. It goes unreturned, and they leave without another word.

The proceeding trip is harder than it should be. Sure enough, Akira’s as good as sober a few minutes into the walk, but his face is still warm and his knees are still weak at the thought of the two of them being someplace private. Staying at his house the entire night. He wants to tell him as soon as they get home, wants to ask him again, as many times as it’ll take to get a straight-forward answer.

Ryuji’s walking a few feet in front of him on the quiet sidewalk, nothing but yellow streetlamps and distant car horns and buzzing cicadas. He’s in that big purple hoodie that puffs out and makes him look larger than he actually is, and if he looks close, if he really concentrates, he can see the slight limp in his step.

Akira’s chest feels like it’s about to burst. Maybe he’ll just kiss him right when they walk in.

(Much, much later, Ryuji'll admit that he'd thought this walk was going to be the final few minutes of their friendship, and that he was practically shaking out of his skin the entire time.)

Neither of them speak until they arrive at the apartment complex, until they come up the concrete stairs again to the door with the silhouette of a 5 where the house number had fallen off. There’s no lights on inside. “You left your sweater here last time,” Ryuji mumbles, digging his key out of his pocket and clumsily unlocking it. His hands seem to be twitching. “Remember to get it before you leave.”

“Okay,” Akira says. He briefly wonders why Ryuji didn’t just return it himself, but then the door pushes open and he loses the thought entirely.

They walk in, and it’s pitch black and smells like cinnamon. Ryuji flicks a light on, shuts the door behind them, throws the keys on the table. He looks at him with a feeling that he can’t quite place, and something snaps inside Akira; he decides he can’t wait any longer, placing one hand on Ryuji’s shoulder and leaning in swiftly—

And Ryuji _ducks_ , swearing and stumbling back out of his grip, tripping over his long legs and ending up on the floor, flat on his back in front of the cluttered table, scrambling onto his knees before Akira can even react. “I-I wasn’t ready, I shoulda braced myself, gimme a second,” he shakes, and he gives him this _pathetic_ look, taking his hoodie off, balling it up and tossing it sideways onto the floor. He then clasps his arms tight behind his back. “Do it, I won’t fight back. Do it.” He squares his shoulders, closes his eyes and bows his head a little. “Do it already, I deserve it,” he pleads, “C-c’mon, I hate _waitin_ ’ for it like this, just _do_ it.”

Akira’s frozen in place, feels his gut churn. “... What are you doing?”

Ryuji’s eyes open, and he stares at him, cocks his head. Then, nervous and defensive, “What’re _you_ doin’?”

It clicks in his mind, and Akira almost yells, “Did you think— did you think I was gonna _hit_ you?”

“What the fuck did you _want_ me to think?” He barks back immediately, rolling to his feet and gripping onto the table behind him when he stumbles, “Don’t look at me like I’m crazy, I swear to God— you were fuckin’ lungin’ at me like you’re gonna punch the _shit_ outta me, what the hell else would you be _doin_ ’?”

“I was gonna _kiss_ you,” he says, a little more threatening than what he’d hoped for. His heart is suddenly going a million miles a second. "D-dumbass," he adds jocularly, even when his voice trembles, trying to soften the blow.

And Ryuji’s tone is so downright horrified when he asks, “ _Why_?” That Akira practically turns to stone.

“Beause I _like_ you,” he shoots back before he can think about it.

Ryuji blinks over and over, short for breath. “... You shouldn't,” he replies roughly, shaking his head. “You shouldn’t.”

“Why the hell not?”

“I can give you a _million_ reasons why not,” he insists. “I’m gross as shit, dude, I’m fuckin’ nasty—”

“Why do you think you’re so _bad_?”

“‘Cause I like you _too_ ,” he sniffs, and Akira can’t move. “I like you so effin’ much, Akira. I like you so much it makes me wanna jump in front of a fuckin’ bus,” and tears start to brim in his eyes, and Akira can’t fucking _move_. “I like how you make me feel n’ how you talk to me, n’ how you act like you belong wherever you are, n’ I like your way of thinkin’ and I like how I feel when I’m with you— God fuckin’ _damnit_ , it’s like I’m fallin’ in _love_ with you or somethin’ lately, it’s _disgustin_ ’, I keep that—” Ryuji wheezes, pulls his phone out of his pocket, starts to pull the battered case off— “I always keep that stupid fuckin’ purikura picture with me, _always_ , n’ I look at it when I’m sad,” he pulls a strip of photo paper out of the case.

“Mine’s under my pillow,” Akira breathes. There’s a moment there in which they simply stare at each other in disbelief, laughing just a little bit at the sheer ridiculousness of the situation. “Why do you— why can’t you like me? Why is it so bad?"

“‘Cause I’m a _guy_!” he flings an arm out, then wipes his eyes with it, putting everything down on the table. “N’ I’ve seen enough movies to know that bad shit happens when two guys like each other! I’m already tryna come to terms with the fact that I like both, like, I’m a fuckin’ _bothsexual_ or whatever, and it’s totally messin' with me— but what if our _friends_ find out, n’ they don’t wanna hang out with us anymore? N’ what if the kids who hate our guts find out? What if my _mom_ finds out, Jesus Christ, she fuckin’ _hates_ fa—” He stops himself, reprimanding with, “She ain’t exactly a fan of the homosexual lifestyle, alright?”

“Ryuji—”

“And— even if nobody kicks our asses, what if we _break_ _up_ or some shit?” He cuts him off, and it sounds like he might start crying again. “Shit, I fuckin' hate havin' gay-ass feelings like this— it’s like— it’s like if I let myself feel like this, I lose you no matter what. I can’t fuckin’ lose you, man,” he whines, “You’re the only good thing that’s happened to me in _years_ , I can’t _lose_ you.” His voice breaks hoarse and weak. “I _can’t_.”

Akira finds feeling in his feet again, and he takes a shaky step forward, forcing his legs to move again and again until he makes it to the table. He drops his bag on the floor, and Ryuji flinches hard at the loud noise. “Hey— hey, look at me,” he says softly, and he cups Ryuji’s cheek in his hand when he hangs his head forward, wipes tears away with his thumb. Everything goes slow and fragile. “I'm not going anywhere. You’re not losing me.”

“I can’t,” he repeats again and again until there’s no sound to it, only the clicking of consonants. “I can’t. I can’t.”

"And you don't deserve to get hit."

"Yeah, yeah I do," he whispers, and Akira immediately starts shaking his head, "Lied to you for _forever_ 'cause I was so scared. Straight up lyin' n' fakin' just 'cause I wanted you to stay. I was hurtin' you. I'm sorry. I'm sorry."

"It's all okay, okay? I'm staying," he says, and Ryuji sniffs, stops crying, meets his eye. "Can I kiss you?” He asks, leaning in until their noses touch and they’re practically kissing already.

“Yeah,” Ryuji barely whispers, and his lips are warm and salty when they finally meet. It’s chaste and gentle and it still sort of tastes like beer, but Akira’s pretty sure he likes it even better than their first.

The apartment seems warmer and less empty after that. Ryuji puts the kettle on, and he lends Akira some sweats and a t-shirt with some stupid meme face on it for pajamas. They drink some shitty green tea he’d pulled out of the pantry and watch cartoons and talk for a little bit, joking and laughing like friends do. When they're tired, Ryuji flicks all the lights off again, and they settle down on the couch with the covers pulled over them. The pillow is soft and woolen—

“Oh, hey,” Akira says, pulling his sweater out from on top of the pillow. “There it is.”

Ryuji stirs, starts laughing nervously. “Hahah, yeah, how’d _that_ shit get there? I don’t— I dunno. That’s weird, I didn’t. Weird.”

Akira snorts, tossing it onto the coffee table. He wraps his arms around Ryuji, nuzzles his face into his neck. He has the best night's sleep he's had in weeks.

* * *

“Hey, um— guys?” Ryuji announces. Only half of their friends even look up— Mishima just keeps eating, and Ann and Yusuke seem to be having a heated debate about nail polish. The classroom is sunny and alive, and it’s empty except for the eight of them. They're always the only ones who come in here during lunch. “Guys,” he says again, and Makoto elbows Yusuke until he shuts up. “I wanted to tell you all something.”

“Go ahead,” says Makoto, and Ryuji swallows.

“Me and— me and Akira are dating,” he says quickly, pointing a hand out to Akira, who waves cutely as if they didn't already know who he was, “A-and I don’t even care if you guys disapprove or anything. If you don’t like it, then you can get the hell out," he claims, tries his best to seem threatening.

All he gets are blank stares. Mishima scratches the back of his neck, whispers something to Makoto.

“Oh, fucking _finally_ ,” says Ann. "You guys have had the weirdest sexual tension for goddamn  _months_."

And then the whole group starts laughing, Akira included. Ryuji's confused out of his mind, and he just holds onto Akira’s shoulder, shaking him a little. “What the hell is going on?” Ryuji hisses, and Ann laughs so hard that she pounds a hand down on her desk. “You guys really don’t care?”

“Dude, you _do_ know everybody in our friend group is bisexual, right?” She squints at him like it’s obvious.

Ryuji’s jaw drops. “Are you fuckin’ with me right now?”

Ann squints at him. “Me and Shiho only broke up when she transferred away, we were dating for months— Ryuji, Yusuke’s sucked, like, _three_ dicks,” she states, and Yusuke seems to take offense for a moment before he shrugs and nods. “You seriously thought we were straight?”

“No— I mean, yeah, but, like—” He feels his face start to flush— “Jesus _fuck_! I was so effin’ worried, and you’re all— _none_ of you are straight?”

They all shake their heads— Ann says, “ _Hell_ no,” as if the very suggestion offends her.

Ryuji is absolutely floored. “How does that even _happen_?”

“Like-minded people are drawn together,” Yusuke says simply, the fake-deep bastard that he is. “Consciously or not.”

There’s a friendly air of agreement. Akira gives him that smug little “ _I_ - _told_ - _you_ - _so_ ” look. Ryuji’s so embarrassed and pissed off that he could kiss it right off his stupid face.


End file.
